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  Wherever would convince new Oratus that the galaxy was a place worth saving.

  Oratus had three moments in their lives when frivolous things were permitted: the death of a pair, the Enlightenment, and Restoration - if an Oratus reached an age or suffered an injury that required severe medical attention. Sax has experienced only one of these, and the short time with Bas and an exploding star dominates his memories when he isn’t fighting for his life.

  Sax is fine with that, though. He doesn’t want his senses to dull. His claws to lose their sharpness or his teeth to forget their taste for the flesh of his enemies.

  But what brings him back to the Enlightenment now is the darkness. “Do you remember,” Sax says. “How they closed the shield for a minute? How the whole room went dark and the only thing you could hear was your own breathing?”

  “Your vents the loudest of all.”

  “I was excited.” Sax grips tighter as Bas lurches up and over another fence.

  “I felt it. You. Your heartbeats through your claws. It was the first time I understood what it meant to be a pair.”

  “A feeling that has never left me.” Sax would say more, except in front of them, up steps that Sax can’t see, an arch of green lights springs to life. The gateway. And, haloed in front of it, Avan.

  31 A City By Torchlight

  By the time I’m done burning Viera’s wounds, the ceremony behind me is over. Jakkan falls silent, and the two priests escort the painted boy from the chamber. Viera, after gnawing through most of the cloth in her mouth, simply passes out and lets me finish the cauterizing.

  When I lift the brand away from the last cut, from the gray puckering flesh that, at least, no longer seeps blood onto the floor, I too feel like collapsing.

  Nicely done. I’d even let you cauterize me. If I had a body.

  Using fire to heal. I’ve seen it done before, though I’d never been a part of it myself. A desperate measure for only the most serious wounds. If there had been a poultice. If there had been needles, then perhaps I could have stitched her up. Bandaged the wounds and left Viera without that burn. But I don’t know this city, and Jakkan offered no assistance.

  “I see you have failed,” Jakkan says when I set the brand down. “I see you return to me with the same medallion you wore when you left.”

  “I did not fail,” I reply, not taking my eyes away from Viera. “I survived the Pits. As you asked.”

  “I did not ask you to survive. I asked you to return with a different medallion. You have not done so, and therefore you have failed.”

  Jakkan’s words are too much. After surviving the juar. After dragging Viera bleeding through the streets of a city I do not know, where people stare at me as if I am the enemy. As if I am not to be touched. Being told I had failed falls on me like a searing weight, and I push back.

  I grab the brand with my right hand and whirl towards Jakkan, stabbing it towards his face.

  “You can say what you like. I lived. I survived your trap.” I take a step forward, and Jakkan stays where he is. The brand comes close to the priest’s face, but he does not waver.

  “Tell me,” Jakkan says. “Did you accomplish what I asked?”

  The brand feels good in my hand. Strong. Heat still radiating from the front of it. With a short jab, I could shove it right into Jakkan’s eye. Or perhaps swing it at his neck. The priest looks unarmed. Vulnerable.

  What then?

  Ignos unleashes a cascade of thoughts: What would come after such a strike? The people of the city would not love me for killing the high priest. How could I say Ignos wants this to happen? Wants the Jakkan murdered in his own sacred temple?

  “No, I did not,” I say the words, but keep the brand up. My eyes strong. Not my fault I failed an impossible task.

  “Then you learned something. Do not let your emotions, do not let the moment carry you away from the facts at hand. A priestess must always, if she is to lead the people, be able to know what is right, no matter her surroundings.” Jakkan looks past me to Viera on the ground. “Who is this woman?”

  “She fought in the Pits with me. We survived,” I launch into a quick version of the story that Jakkan hears without emotion.

  Without reaction.

  “You have led her here. Dripped her blood on my floor. Burned her wounds with a sacred instrument,” Jakkan grasps the brand I hold, his hand touching mine on the cool end of the metal. “Do you understand the sacrilege that you have committed? To save a nonbeliever?”

  “I made a vow to protect her, and she did the same for me,” I say. “Ignos would understand.”

  Jakkan rips the brand out of my hand. Tosses it across the room, where it hits off of the wall to the ground. Gives Viera a dismissive look. “She will be fine for now. Come with me.”

  We sweep out of the chambers, towards the steps. I spare one last glance at Viera, who’s still unconscious. Then I follow Jakkan all the way up to the top of the Vaos. He stops and rests one hand on the East altar. Waits for me to take everything in.

  The view is incredible. Unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. The blazing of a hundred thousand torches lights up the streets like a glittering ocean in the dark. Above me, the stars fade against the orange firelight, as if Damantum exists in a world of its own, banishing the outside with the glow of its people.

  “I always find Damantum more beautiful at night,” Jakkan says. “When you have proof of all the life that is here. A Charre lit each of these fires. A Charre interested in preserving our city. Our livelihood, our civilization. So long as these torches are lit, Damantum will continue. Ignos will be worshipped.”

  “Why did you bring me here?” I say.

  “I’ve inquired about you,” Jakkan replies. “From Malo, from the warriors that journeyed with you. They all believe what you claim. To a man. They say you hear from Ignos himself. They say that you will take my place.”

  At this last, Jakkan looks straight at me. I expect an accusation, hatred or jealousy to show. Jakkan, however, keeps the same blank slate. He gives no hints to me as to what he wants, as to what he needs me to say.

  All of my life, I’d been given little hope of power. Little chance of position. My destiny had been chosen by my sex. Standing on top of the Vaos, for once, I cannot tell where my own future lies. Options abound. So many paths to follow. And all of them could be swept away if Jakkan chooses to cast me down.

  “I don’t want your place,” I say. “Ignos chose to bring me here. I’m only following his will.”

  “And his will must be respected.” Jakkan nods at the medallion around my neck. “This first task proves that Malo was right. Ignos favors you. How many escape the Pits when faced with the juar?”

  I don’t know. Jakkan doesn’t wait for me to answer.

  “None,” Jakkan says. “None.”

  “They said the one who lives longer gets to leave?”

  “A ploy to get some fight from you,” Jakkan almost looks sad, but then his face slides into the straight mask. “Should your friend have fallen, the crowd would have cheered your own death moments later.”

  “How was I supposed to survive, then?”

  “You found a way.” Jakkan says, as if that answers the question, then waves away my open mouth. “You understand my responsibility. The Emperor looks to me for Ignos’ guidance. Therefore I must be sure that any who claims to speak for him truly hears his words.”

  “I escaped the Pits, as you said. Isn’t that enough?”

  “You may have his luck, but are you truly his vessel?” Jakkan says. “Tomorrow there will be a sacrifice. For the boy that you saw, in honor of his approaching manhood. In honor of his parent’s life. You will perform it. You will conduct the ritual, and you will give us a message from Ignos. Do it well, and I will grant you your audience with the Emperor. More so, I will grant you a chance to join me. To lead the city into the light it deserves.”

  When the two of us descend, some hours later, after conversations of home and life in the city, Jakkan goes first. I follow, almost bumping into the high priest when he stops at the entrance to the chambers. Jakkan turns to me, a small smile on his face. “It seems the one you rescued has no wish to thank you.”

  I look around Jakkan and see only dried blood stains on the temple floor. Viera is gone.

  32 No Hesitation

  Sax only has a moment to think before the gateway opens. In that moment, hope and hunger mix with the sudden light to push him forward. He bounds past Bas, clenches his legs, and leaps towards Avan’s shadow.

  The low gravity gives Sax plenty of lift, and he drops the miner as he glides through the air. He has no chance of hitting anything with it anyway, and the satisfaction of a laser is nothing compared to the visceral cutting of his claws.

  The gateway doesn’t wait for Sax. It shunts open, sliding up into the wall of the seed ship, and reveals a waiting Sevora force. More Flaum, because the standard-issue troops are always there, but what catches Sax’s attention as he flies are the Slivers; worm-like things with gossamer wings that glow violet as they fly over Avan’s head.

  Each of the four Slivers has, grafted onto their many legs, heat stingers: small lasers that, individually, are nothing more than annoying. Together, the simultaneous blasts can overwhelm a target’s nervous system. Send them twitching to the floor. Means the Sevora aren’t giving up on capturing the Oratus after all.

  The Slivers, though, didn’t expect to see Sax flying through the air towards them, claws extended and ready to rend. He hits a Sliver before it has a chance to move, and Sax doesn’t even have to bite - his weight alone crumples the fragile creature and they both plummet towards the gateway floor.

  Avan, and his new Flaum friends, notice. And, as Sax crashes down into their mix, they scatter
. Sax doesn’t even get a swipe in at Avan before the captive Oratus is gone. Pressing through the Flaum and through the gateway.

  Coward.

  Sax would follow, but he’s otherwise occupied. The Flaum are overcoming their own surprise, turning their miners on Sax. Sitting still means a quick roasting at the hands of their lasers, so Sax moves.

  Surrounding an Oratus at close range is like being in a razor blade tornado: Sax darts at a Flaum near the gateway, while his tail whips towards the Flaum left of that one. He digs his claws into fur, then leaps off to another one. Red bolts flash where he was, coupling with the green light of the gate and the filtering blue aura of the new section beyond to create a washed out strobe effect.

  Sax barely registers the faces. The targets. Without the Stim, he can’t keep up with his own instinct, and simply responds to touch. To the tear of claw through cloth. To the thwack of his tail swatting another Flaum to the ground. It’s a massacre, a chaotic frenzy.

  Until sudden burning drives Sax down.

  33 Hold The Knife

  Dust motes dance in the light of dawn as I open my eyes and look out through the open archway from my room. One of four leading off of Jakkan’s main chamber in the Vaos, the high priest had let me settle into the spare space. The mat on the stone floor suffices, though I prefer soft jungle ground where I don’t wake with aches in my back.

  Not that it had been a restful night anyway: Jakkan didn’t spend any time worrying about Viera, but instead showed me the scrolls with depictions of Charre rites, told me to read, and then vanished into his own chambers.

  I’d taken the scrolls and sat next to the fire. Read one after another. Familiarized myself with tales and odes, songs and prayers, some of which were known to me and others far different. The Charre rites are like relatives - their shapes and duties recognizable, their names changed. So similar that I started putting in Solare words where they didn’t belong. Found myself sinking into the stories told around my village’s campfires instead of the ritual tales in front of me.

  I suggest you find a way to your bed, Kaishi. You’re turning the scroll awfully slow, and as much as I like rereading the same words endlessly, it’s become a bit boring.

  But I had to learn. I shook my head. Tried to open my eyes all the way.

  Not all of it, and not right now. I’ve read everything you have, and I’ll feed it to you during the ceremony. However, I can’t lift your arms. Can’t speak from your mouth. So if you don’t have the energy to manage that, then we’re both going out the grisly way.

  I supposed that if I was going to trust anyone to get a ceremony right, it would be a god. So I accepted Ignos’ offer and stumbled to my chamber, collapsed on the mat and sank into a too-short slumber till, what seemed like moments later, Jakkan woke me with the breaking of dawn.

  The high priest holds a new, beautiful cape for me. Weavers have speckled the cloth in oranges and blues. Expensive dyes. Colors only worn by those of noble rank, or that had given their lives to Ignos.

  Jakkan himself says so, and he wears similar finery. Gold hoops hang from his ears and another ring from his nose. His hair is tied in a knot on top of his head with silver bands. His hands hold still more jewelry, which he hands out to me.

  “Today these are yours,” Jakkan says. “If this goes as you wish it, then tomorrow you shall have your own.”

  The earrings, speckled with rubies and sapphires, appear to be small depictions of Ignos. I slip them on, then comes the piece for my nose. A swooping golden band made to look like waves of light in early morning. Thus adorned, I wait for Jakkan, who had retreated to his chambers. This time he emerges with a couple of pots. Each one filled with dye. He sets them down in the middle of the room and then, nodding to me, goes to the far window.

  This side of the Vaos looks out to the West, opposite where Ignos rises. On the mountains overlooking the city, I can see Ignos’ dawn display: purple, brown, orange and yellow as the light glances off the peaks and the slopes below to paint the fields in Ignos’ colors.

  “It is the most divine part of the day,” Jakkan says. “Evidence that the Ignos’ will is truly beautiful. We must remind the people of that. Today you have a chance to do so. I will be there, yet you alone will speak the prayers. I trust you have learned what you wish to say?”

  I nod, though in truth, I only have glimmers. Before, at the crashed ship and at my village, I had spoken from my heart. From Ignos’ instruction. I’ve never performed a formal rite, much less a sacrifice.

  A show, and little more. I’ll send you the right words, and so long as you put enough spark into the right actions, they’ll love you for it.

  “You have performed a ceremony before?” Jakkan asks.

  “No. I left my village before Ignos gave me the chance.”

  Jakkan actually looks pleased at this. “The first time you hold the knife is a moment you will remember forever. You become one with the teachings. You will feel the power of Ignos as you give the greatest honor to your sacrifice. Though I must warn you: do not let the blade fall from your hands, no matter how heavy it feels. Strike with strength and make a clean cut. Ignos will be watching.”

  A pair of other priests enter the temple, and I stand still as they apply dyes to my face. To my shoulders and the rest of my body. Coloring me like the blue and purple cliffs. Making me the very image of dawn.

  By the time they finish, Ignos is high and already a crowd gathers outside. Their murmurs and cries of deals offered and taken buzz in through the front of the Vaos. I’m not sure what to do next, so I wait for Jakkan, who, eyes closed, appears to be muttering prayers to himself.

  When his lips fall still, he nods for a second, then asks me; “You are ready?”

  There is only one answer to that question. “I am.”

  The high priest leads me from the temple, out onto the landing where the crowd, so many thousands, begins to cheer. Jakkan holds his arms high and wide, as if embracing the chants. I follow his lead, holding my arms out and soaking in the stares. The strange looks. The mild hush that comes over the hustle and bustle as the people notice their high priest stands with another.

  A woman shares his place. One, by look, not of their city or their people.

  “Yes,” Jakkan announces. “You have noticed that I do not take this stage alone. Beside me is a priestess. A voice of Ignos. She comes from far away, and Ignos has seen fit to pass his wisdom through her to us. Today, she will lead the sacrifice in his honor. Today we welcome this new priestess into our city. We welcome her wisdom, as it comes from Ignos himself.”

  The crowd stays silent for a moment. Evaluating Jakkan’s words. Seeing through them, looking for the joke. Looking for a reason to disbelieve.

  Now is the first chance. Tell them who you are. Strike the spark that will become the fire of their belief.

  “My name is Kaishi, and I bring the heart of the jungle to this holy city. The gods have bade me bring their message to you. Ignos moves my lips and it is his words that pass from me to you. They are the words of our hope and salvation. They are the words that will bring Damantum to a new and brighter age.”

  Still the crowd looks wary, muttering to themselves. Until Jakkan, taking my hand in his and holding it high announces, “We honor Ignos, together.”

  That, at last, breaks the hold on the crowd. They cheer. Loud enough to rock the temple’s foundations, or so it seems. My nerves go numb, my legs grow tight. My heart beats so fast I’m afraid it’s going to burst. This, this is what my father must have felt every ceremony. This is what he had been talking about when he referred to the pulse of Ignos. His energy flowing through Father. Now, it flows through me.

  Jakkan wastes no time and leads me up the steps to the very top of the Vaos. There are the twin altars, gleaming and wet from a washing earlier that morning. A pair of guards, wearing bear skins and holding their spears in one hand, stand ready. Another priest, with robes not quite as fancy as theirs, holds, on red cloth, a black-glass blade. Half as long as my arm, the mottled and jagged knife is like a shadow. Heavy, sharp. It will cut through bone as easy as through melon.